


Butterflies in the Dark

by thatsrightdollface



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Despair (Dangan Ronpa), Breaking and Entering, Butterfly Observatory, Developing Relationship, First Dates, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mentions of Cancer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-16
Packaged: 2019-07-30 00:08:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16275182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatsrightdollface/pseuds/thatsrightdollface
Summary: Hajime doesn't know what to think when Nagito Komaeda asks him to meet up at the butterfly observatory in the middle of the night.  Is this a date, or something?I wrote this for the Komahina Secret Exchange on tumblr, as a gift for tumblr user cactuplant.  It's for her prompt, “Hajime realizes he has feelings for Nagito but when Nagito asks Hajime to go to the butterfly observatory at night with him, he doesn't know how to react (he gets butterflies in his stomach aha).”





	1. Invitations

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cactuplant](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=cactuplant).



> Hi~ This is my third and final story for the 2018 Komahina Secret Exchange! It was very fun to write -- I really enjoyed cactuplant's prompts. :') I hope you enjoy this, if you read it! I'll be posting the next two chapters here soon.

At first, Hajime Hinata of the Hope’s Peak Academy Reserve Course had come to that bench by the fountain to be alone.  He hadn’t watched the water twist in the sun so much as stared past it, back then.  He’d stared and obsessed over what he was…  _What he meant,_ as a person _…_   And he’d tried his best to breathe a little steadier despite the pressure of that Reserve Course tie around his neck.  “Branded.”  “Unworthy.”  Hajime had scolded himself with words like that all the time, before.  Before Chiaki Nanami started meeting him there, in the golden sunset waiting-time by the benches.  First Chiaki, the Ultimate Gamer herself, and then – as the months wound on and she started leading him along to gatherings with her lofty, too-talented Main School class – _someone else._

Honestly, Hajime hadn’t expected Chiaki…  Or, you know, _anyone_ …  To want him to watch the fireworks together with all those fancy, good-enough-to-be-chosen elite students.  He hadn’t expected to get permission slips shoved into his hands and then signed a bunch of times by his (very confused) parents, either, so he could participate in video game tournaments and unexpectedly chaotic picnics and whatever else came along.  But Chiaki’s teacher wrote up those permission slips herself, whether or not the school board would’ve gone along with it, and she talked Hajime into using them because she thought it’d be good for him…  And if he wouldn’t go along with _that_ line or reasoning, at least they could both agree it’d make Chiaki smile for some reason Hajime was still learning to understand.  A real, self-respecting Main Course teacher going out of her way for him, can you believe that?

Hajime hadn’t.  Not at first, not until he’d actually turned in those permission slips and was on his way to the beach with Chiaki and her class that very first time.  Just like the courtyard with the fountain and the benches was so often empty, Hajime had felt hollow inside, too.  A vessel waiting to be filled by some grand potential that never came…  A shell of the self Hajime had expected to grow up into somehow when he was a kid.

He – that “someone else” who came to meet Hajime by the benches, now – had said he understood hollow _wanting_ like that from the beginning.  From the first time Hajime had ended up sitting next to him on the bus ride down to the beach, actually, with his shakily-filled out permission slip still sitting on the teacher’s desk back at Hope’s Peak.  Nagito Komaeda had sat very carefully, arms wrapped around the backpack he’d brought – (full of emergency supplies, apparently.  The Ultimate Lucky Student had prepared for all kinds of possibilities, like getting stranded in the middle of the empty ocean on a surfboard or being accidentally swallowed by a whale.)  He’d smiled so serenely…  So patiently…  That it had been infuriating for reasons Hajime wouldn’t have been able to explain.  Under different circumstances, he knew – _even_ _then_ – that he would’ve loved a smile like that.

“I know why you don’t want to meet anyone’s eyes…  The Ultimate Students’, I mean,” Nagito had said.  When he laughed, it felt sort of like he knew secrets Hajime would really rather he didn’t.   “Don’t worry, though – I heard Ms. Yukizome reminding you to come, and you should know _I’m_ just like you.  No talent I worked hard for, no shining skill I can carry around with any real pride.  Honestly, it’s kind of a relief you’re here!  I have a hard time believing such talented people as my classmates really have much to say to someone like me.”

Hajime hadn’t had much to say to Nagito that first day, either.  Not right away, at least.  He’d watched the Ultimate Animal Breeder’s army of hamsters build a monstrous fortress in the sand; he’d stood by with a hopefully-not-too-jealous expression on while the Ultimate Mechanic added dozens of new, delicious features to some vender’s sno-cone machine.  To impress the Ultimate Princess, apparently – Nagito Komaeda whispered explanations about that over Hajime’s shoulder with another nervous little laugh.  _He’d_ won an all-expenses-paid diving trip just by opening up one of the expired juice boxes that same sno-cone sales guy was about to throw out…  Though about an hour after all that Nagito’d _also_ sliced his foot open on some poisonous sea urchin that had been mostly hidden under the sand.

He said his luck came and went like that, like a rollercoaster he’d been strapped into since the day he was born.  And really, Hajime had to admit it did feel kind of surreal, that bad luck.  It put Nagito’s gentle smiles in a new kind of perspective, or something.

See, Nagito’d really only stepped into the ocean for a second, just to grab a blown-away beach ball for some of the others.  Pretty awful luck, right?  And to start off, Hajime had felt like it was pretty awful luck that _he_ had happened to be the one closest to Nagito at the time, too.  He’d ended up in the ambulance with him, and he’d helped Nagito and Chiaki’s teacher fill out an incident report, and when Nagito was checked out of the hospital…  Well.  Hajime had still been there in the waiting room, wondering why exactly he was sitting around for him but finding it strangely impossible to leave Nagito by himself.

It turned out Nagito had an unexpectedly calming presence, when he wasn’t talking all intensely about the talent Hajime didn’t have – when he was doing stuff like telling Hajime not to freak out about all the blood in the water, for instance, or trying to distract him from the way his leg was turning purplish-green.  Who knew?  He was easy to talk to, and earnestly warm, and he’d held on to Hajime’s arm when the pain got really bad during that ambulance ride.

Maybe that was what did it.  The way Nagito had held on to him, as if he saw Hajime as the sort of guy who’d hold still and solid, whatever else he was missing as a Hope’s Peak Academy student.  As a person.

Chiaki had waited with Hajime for a while, too, until she had to go Class Rep some of her other classmates into something like peace – apparently the Ultimate Photographer’d had an art exhibition going on, and somehow that tied into stuff with the yakuza?  Hajime wasn’t clear on the details, but it all seemed to work out fine.  Something about “touching family reunions” and the “Ultimate Little Sister.”  Anyway, Chiaki took her waterproof, beach-ready video game set with her when she had to hurry away, and Hajime had been left with piles of old, sticky magazines to flip through…  But by now, he didn’t think even that was such bad luck at all.

Nagito was sitting on Hajime’s favorite bench all by himself, the day he offered up an invitation of his own.  Sometimes he waited with Chiaki, and all three of them went somewhere together.  The arcade, or someplace for dinner, or on a mysterious, accidental subterranean tunnel adventure courtesy of Nagito’s wonky luck.  You know.  Other times Nagito came along to supervise, maybe because the Ultimate Animal Breeder wanted to show off something with a lot of dripping fangs, maybe because the Ultimate Gymnast and the Ultimate Team Manager were debating about what Hajime would be like as a participant in one of their school-shattering sparring sessions.  But really?  Truly?  Hajime always found himself walking over to the benches a little faster when he saw it was Nagito there alone.

He had no idea why that could’ve been, of course.  Nagito Komaeda stood up to meet him, and Hajime tripped just a little over his own feet.

“Ah, Hajime,” Nagito said.  He grinned, but it was sort of wistful.  Sort of strange.  He ran a long, slender hand through his perpetually flyaway hair.

And, “Ah, Nagito,” Hajime answered back.  He was mirroring Nagito’s tone a little snarkily, now, which he thought might make that wistfulness transform itself into a smirk.  “What’s up?  You’re looking at me funny.  Uh.  Funnier than usual, I mean?”

Nagito shrugged, then.  He stuffed his hands in his pockets, and studied the courtyard fountains for a second.  Or, actually…  Maybe he stared right past them, the way Hajime had before Chiaki had first tried to get him to see himself as a complete person.

“Tomorrow’s a pretty big day for me, to be honest,” Nagito said, when he was ready.  His voice was so quiet, Hajime imagined himself reaching over and pulling Nagito closer.  Teasing him until he relaxed, and the stiffness in his shoulders loosened away.

He didn’t.  Obviously.  When had Hajime started imagining dumb stuff like that, anyway?

Nagito couldn’t exactly hear any of Hajime’s inner monologue, there…  So out in the real, actual world he cleared his throat and kept going.  “And, you know, because of that – mostly – I was wondering if you’d do me a favor, tonight.  It’s nothing too dangerous, I don’t think.”

Hajime answered, “Yeah, sure.  What d’you need?” without even pausing to think through what stacks of Reserve Course busywork he might have to go through that night.  Without pausing to think about anything, really, except maybe the distracted look on Nagito’s face.

It turned out Nagito wanted Hajime to meet him at the butterfly observatory around eleven, so they could sneak in and “be ready” – though for what, Hajime didn’t know – by midnight.  Nagito asked sort of like he expected Hajime to change his mind, backtrack and go on his merry way.  But Hajime wasn’t sure _what_ to say, at first.  He settled on “Of Course.”  Of course he’d be there – of course he was open to a little breaking-and-entering to see some bugs.  Didn’t Nagito know he was a career criminal, specifically focused on bug-based crime?

That sort of flippant answer was easier than admitting anything like the truth: Hajime’s insides had exploded into a flurry of butterflies even just considering midnight with Nagito Komaeda.  Midnight with butterflies drifting around them like unstuck stars…  Midnight completely alone together, except possibly for whatever security guards dropped by to arrest them.

Nagito had nodded gratefully, next.  Carefully.  He slipped his cellphone number into Hajime’s hands, and wandered away somewhere.  As soon as Hajime was _sure_ he was gone – and no one was watching from behind the walls or snorkeling around inexplicably in one of the fountains – he flopped down on the bench with his face in his hands.  He _knew_ his fingers wouldn’t quite be able to hide the huge, shaky smile he was wearing about then.  It was the sort of smile Hajime’d never, ever expected to wear as a member of the Hope’s Peak Academy Reserve Course, but somehow –

Somehow –

There he was.


	2. Glass and Wings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... And the story continues!
> 
> Thank you for reading, and I'm sorry for any mistakes I may have made. Have a wonderful day!

It was simpler than Hajime had thought it would be, sneaking into the butterfly observatory that night.  Maybe he should’ve expected as much, tagging along with the Ultimate Lucky Student.  Nagito just led him through the chilly dark of the parking lot and around the curve of the glossy marble museum-ish building, walking like he did this sort of thing all the time.  He looked unusually thin and sort of ghostly under the streetlights.  All the stained glass images worked into the side of the observatory – butterflies and spindly flowers, gemstone forests and smiling strangers – were so dim, with the building lights off inside.  Hajime had never seen them this way, just like he had never seen Nagito in a tattered coat and sneakers, or expected that he would scatter in so many smiley faces when he texted.

Hajime wasn’t sure exactly what Nagito was planning until they’d circled around for a little while and – when they suddenly stopped – ended up in front of a break room window left propped just the tiniest bit open.  As if it was waiting that way – as if it had been pried up, earlier, to let in a breeze while an employee was eating lunch or something.

“You know,” Nagito said, dragging over a cheerfully painted dumpster to give himself a boost, “I’d wager the fact that this window was left open means the observatory’s alarms didn’t set right, when the place was locked up.  What do you say, Hajime?”

“I guess I say, ‘how often do _you_ actually lose bets?’” Hajime offered.

Nagito heaved himself onto the dumpster first and dragged the window properly open, wide enough to climb through.  He reached down to offer Hajime a hand up, but then paused, considering.  The more time they spent together, the more hesitant Nagito seemed to get about attempting anything remotely dangerous by Hajime’s side.  It wasn’t so much of a mystery why: Nagito’s luck would play tricks on him, probably forever...  And it definitely wasn’t as though people hadn’t been caught in the middle of it before.  Hajime – not to mention Nagito’s own class – all had the healed-up wounds and bizarre stories to prove that dozens of times over.

Nagito _did_ clasp Hajime’s hand, in the end, though, and his skin was cold, covered in tiny scars.  Burns and pavement-scrapes, stuff like that, mixed in with a couple Pokémon bandages Hajime figured Chiaki had probably put on for him just that afternoon, carefully folded around some antibacterial goo from the Ultimate Nurse’s schoolbag.  Nagito pulled Hajime up beside him, and the pale moonlight was all tangled up in his hair, and they climbed into the Gokuhara Butterfly Observatory together.

It seemed like Nagito knew just where he wanted to go, once they got inside.  The real show wasn’t in the staff breakroom, with its rows of scuffed lockers and that glassy, staring TV propped way up in the corner.  And it wasn’t in the winding “butterfly education”-y hallways, either, even if Hajime’s heart _was_ hammering as they made their way through.  Maybe Nagito hunted around for the lights because Hajime seemed nervous, or maybe he mostly wanted to read the informational signs a little easier.

It felt sort of like the portrait of that observatory’s huge, wild-haired founder was grinning at them personally, though, and they _did_ stop to investigate some of the displays every now and then.  Hajime thought he saw at least one plaque thanking strangers with the last name “Komaeda” for a “Generous Donation,” but he didn’t feel right asking about all that, yet.  Nagito led him to the crystalline double-doors of the butterfly interaction hall, and fiddled around with a (locked) supply desk until he managed to produce two stick thingies with sponges dipped in sugar water or something on the ends.

“To feed them,” Nagito clarified, passing a stick over to Hajime.  “If you’d like.”

Rows of shivery light-strings switched on when they swung open those doors, then, and the air was so sweet and heavy with flowers.  Hajime figured there must have been gardeners brought in to take care of that exhibit practically all day, every day – it was such a lush, wild, living place, woven into a sort of maze with lots of different pathways running through.

And the butterflies.  Of course, the butterflies.  They flitted through that maze like a kaleidoscope come to life, bright as light off the water and dark as the velvet lining in jewelry boxes.  They were so fragile-seeming – so horribly _squishable_ – and yet they flew like they didn’t know how to be afraid, here.

Nagito froze, sugary butterfly-feeding sponge thing dripping by his feet, and watched them…  So Hajime watched, too, trying to understand what exactly he saw.  In the end, Nagito just wound up laughing sort of softly when one of those butterflies tried perching on the spikes of Hajime’s hair.  Hajime shooed it off, but he tried to be nice about it.  Mumbled something about how the butterfly would probably rather sit on a sugary sponge than pee on his head, right?  Right.

By the time they’d walked around the garden-maze long enough for Hajime to thoroughly empathize with the kids on field trips who probably got lost there, it was very nearly midnight.  Whatever Nagito had been preparing for, wasn’t it going to happen then?  The stars seemed so close above them, through the domed glass roof of that butterfly observatory.  They mingled with the strung chains of lights, just a bit, except where they’d been smeared out by hazy purplish clouds.

A couple minutes before midnight, Hajime caught himself just before he stepped on a dusky blue butterfly skittering by on their path.  Its legs were thinner and more snap-able than toothpicks, and one of its wings had been torn.  It was ragged at the edges, that wing, and it left the whole butterfly unbalanced.  If it fell there, Hajime didn’t think it would be able to pick itself back up…  But it was trying to walk on, anyway.  Where would a butterfly like that even be able to go?  It had been rattling around in a beautiful glass box, even back when it had known how to fly.

Hajime might’ve just left that butterfly to its sad little march, if you’d gotten to him before Chiaki…  Before that bench by the fountain and the dripping golden light there.  Before Nagito Komaeda.  Hajime had spent so long telling himself that he was either worth it or he wasn’t.  He either had the talent that it took to matter, or the world wouldn’t feel too bad about smearing him beneath its shoes.

Now, though, Hajime crouched down and held out his butterfly-feeding sponge to the wobbly little thing, coaxing a bit under his breath until it managed to climb onboard.  Nagito watched him – he knew because he checked over his shoulder, just once or twice – and Hajime thought his eyes had gone soft and warm and somehow very far away.

“Maybe someone can fix that wing,” Nagito said.  “If we remember what flowers you drop the poor guy off on, we could leave a note about it at the desk, I guess.”

Hajime wasn’t so sure about modern butterfly wing technology, but…  Who knew, with luck and uncanny intuition like Nagito’s?  He was actually still trying to get the dang butterfly _off_ his feeding stick thingy – it was clinging on for dear life, now, and snubbing even the nicest flowers he could find – when an alarm chimed on Nagito’s phone, though.  Midnight.

Nagito let out a low, rattling sigh, then, and ran his fingers down his face.  Flexed them in the air, as if testing his joints.  He pinched his own arm, just a little, and met Hajime’s eyes for a long time before Hajime reminded him to maybe turn _off_ that alarm and – possibly? – let him know what the heck was really going on here.  He considered making a joke about this being one of the weirdest dates he’d ever been on, but truth be told…  Hajime wasn’t exactly sure this _was_ a date, even if they were alone, now, and even if it was midnight and all the rest.  Truth be told, Hajime hadn’t actually been on any sort of date before this, so he couldn’t completely trust his ability to judge.

“Of course.  Of course,” Nagito said.  Those were the same words Hajime had reached for, earlier, but Nagito said them slowly, now…  Like he wasn’t sure how to squish words together at all just then.  “It’s just – it’s tomorrow, which means I’m officially not expected to be here.”

“Well, no,” Hajime snorted.  Of everything Nagito could have potentially said, he hadn’t been prepared for _that_.  Maybe it was his laughter that did it, though – the butterfly tottered off his sugary feeding stick thing and into a bunch of papery pale-sunset flowers.  “Neither am I.  We climbed in a window and probably left footprints on somebody’s break table.”

“Fair point,” Nagito said, and he started making his way over toward Hajime.  They might have left the conversation at that, if a couple crumpled-up hospital forms hadn’t fallen out of his coat pocket at right that exact second.  _Luck_ , right?  Nagito swayed on his feet sometimes, as if he was always a little dizzy…  He didn’t manage to scoop the papers back up before Hajime grabbed at them.

Hajime’s face must have gotten sort of scary, skimming over those papers – he could hear it in the nervous shake of Nagito’s voice, when he laughed…  When he said, “Oh, no.  I guess chance decided for me?” in a voice like he might’ve wanted to smack “chance” right across the face.  There were a lot of words Hajime had a hard time swallowing, printed along those pages – _“stage three malignant lymphoma”_ and _“frontotemporal dementia”_ and stuff like that – along with a string of procedure records and prescriptions and –

Hajime didn’t fight, when Nagito slid the papers out of his hands and wadded them back up in his pockets.  “Maybe I should’ve told you a long time ago…  Or maybe I shouldn’t have burdened you with this at all.  I was still trying to decide.”  Nagito scrunched the papers down deep, deep into his coat, now.  Distractedly.  Smiling, somehow, though it didn’t seem to be an easy smile.  It reminded Hajime of what it had been like when they were seated on that bus together on the way to the beach, sort of – too gentle, almost unknowable.  More than anything, that smile was painfully familiar, by now.

“You can tell me,” Hajime said.  “I’d rather you tell me.”

Nagito took a deep breath.  Said, “Alright: as of right now, I’ve officially lived longer than every doctor I’ve ever spoken with thought was possible.  I’m probably just lucky.  I know I’m…  You know, _lucky_.  But a little while before I met you, I was given six months to a year left alive, and most second opinions gave me less, but –”

“But now it’s a year and a day,” Hajime finished.  Nagito didn’t seem to mind.  If anything, maybe he was relieved they were on something like the same page, here.

Nagito said the next part like he’d practiced it in his head over and over again.  He recited it, really. “For the past year, _every checkup_ …  I could tell they all thought I’d unravel fast.  They reminded me, every time.  I might not make it my next appointment.  I might not make it to the end of the semester.  I’m so tired of hearing it and not knowing when my luck would finally run out…  It would be a real irony if I died tonight, though, wouldn’t it Hajime?”

“You’re not gonna die,” Hajime said.  Around him, the butterfly exhibit seemed just _so alive_ , so vibrant and sure of everything it was.  It was little flurries of movement out of the corner of his eye.  It was fragile wings that still didn’t realize they might be torn at any second.

“At any rate, I knew I didn’t want to be alone,” Nagito said.  “I mean…  No, that’s not all of it.  I wanted you to understand.  Chiaki keeps saying you could actually like m –”  Nagito trailed off, and then scratched at the back of his head, wincing.  “I…  Dang, I guess I thought if I chickened out you might at least get an interesting date out of this.  Something no one else would’ve already planned for you, you know?”

There was a lot Hajime could’ve said back to that, but before he sorted through all his thoughts – before his mind had a chance to catch up with him, really – he said, _“_ Okay, let’s get one thing straight: _you never have to be alone.”_ He didn’t like the vulnerability in his own voice, but there it was, whether he wanted it or not.  “You should know that.  You’re not facing your weird luck, or – or _this_ – all by yourself, okay?”

Nagito’s mouth dropped open, just a bit, and he stared like he wasn’t sure what to say.  Finally, he shook his head and slipped his hand into Hajime’s own.  He squeezed Hajime’s fingers gently – reassuringly, despite everything between them.  Despite what he had scrunched up at the very bottom of his coat pockets, and despite the fact that Hajime still hadn’t told him if this was an interesting date idea or not.

“I never thought I’d actually say this, but sometimes I wonder if maybe Chiaki has a point – about people, and talent…  And happiness,” Nagito confessed.  It looked like he meant something more by that – like he was remembering stuff he’d said about Hajime’s talent over their months together, and considering what it meant to stand with someone else no matter what worth they thought they carried into the world.  He would sort those words out later, Hajime figured.  Knowing Nagito Komaeda, he’d probably string them all into a long, rambly monologue about _hope_ one of these days.  Hope through bonds, as well as talent; hope through facing the unknown knowing you’re breakable, _everyone’s always breakable_ , but you still don’t have to be alone.

For now, though, Nagito said, “Hey, would you like to see my favorite spot in the observatory?  That’s where we were headed, before you made a friend back there.”

The broken-winged butterfly was lost somewhere in the flowers, then, as Hajime and Nagito walked deeper into the maze and that next, impossible day truly and honestly began.


	3. Epilogue - Metamorphosis

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi~ Thank you very much for reading this far! I hope you enjoy the rest of the fic. 
> 
> It's been so fun participating in the Komahina Secret Exchange, ahhh. :')

Nagito didn’t wear his prestigious Main School uniform to Hajime’s Reserve Course graduation, but he _did_ wear what would’ve probably been a very nice suit if he hadn’t somehow gotten caught in an exceptionally muddy police chase on his way to the ceremony.  There was a silvery butterfly on his tie clip, and he filmed Hajime receiving his diploma like something so mundane could actually matter a lot to him…  Like just the act of being there and waving long enough that Hajime saw and waved back could bring him – even if not the entire world – a little hope.  That recording came along with a bunch of murmured, affectionate commentary that made Hajime blush and shove playfully at Nagito’s arm when they watched through it, later, and that got a couple of the parents in the row behind him nudging his shoulder even as it was being filmed and hissing, _“Shh!”_

Over the past few years before then, Hajime had learned the actual, human names of plenty of his Reserve Course classmates, and he’d been joined on the benches by those Hope’s Peak Academy courtyard fountains time after time after time.  He’d attended the Ultimate Musician’s surprisingly horror movie-ish concerts, and cheered from the bleachers during a few property damage-heavy sports days.  He’d visited the beach without anyone getting sliced open by venomous sea urchins, too, even if Nagito _had_ found something that may or may not have been a gold-plated skeleton buried in the sand.   Its gleaming finger-bones had been clutching a leathery map and everything…  But they’d just re-buried it and tried to focus on playing volleyball.

Nagito hadn’t needed to attend even one of his ominous brain-scanning hospital appointments by himself, too, and nearly all the nurses had learned both Hajime’s name _and_ how much he hated it when anybody reminded Nagito that they wouldn’t have expected him to be alive.  “Your Classmate,” those doctors had called him at first, before they realized Hajime was in the Hope’s Peak Reserve Course.  Then they’d tried “Your Friend,” but now – _now_ – they all knew better than that.  A friend might not have kissed Nagito’s forehead when he woke up, after all, or smoothed his tangled hair off his cheek with such a practiced hand.

They’d gone to the butterfly observatory a couple times during the day, by now, but it was never the same as it had been that first midnight.  It didn’t have to be, really.  So much about their personal worlds had changed back then, anyway, it almost wouldn’t have been fair if the butterfly observatory had been left standing still.

After the graduation ceremony, Hajime’s parents ushered the both of them back to the apartment Hajime had grown up in for dinner.  Nagito had never been there before - he studied all the framed photographs in the hallway, running his hand along the glass. Leaving smeary fingerprints behind that he barely seemed to see; telling Hajime that he had his grandfather’s ears, that he smiled like his mom…  Stuff like that.  There was something almost reverent in Nagito’s voice, then – like he was talking about hope, or staring wide-eyed at butterflies under the hazy starlight.  _People, and true hope, and happiness_.  Hajime told Nagito that he’d ask his parents to hang a picture with the both of them in it together, one of these days, and even though Nagito protested a little in the moment he also – (later) – hinted that he liked the glossy brown frames best.

When they ate gathered around Hajime’s childhood table… Nagito clearly scrambling for appropriate and not-too-over-the-top answers to Hajime’s parents’ questions, evening seeping in softly outside the window…  Hajime felt more complete than he could have ever expected back when he’d enrolled in the Hope’s Peak Academy Reserve Course.  The light around them was syrupy and golden, sort of like it had been when Chiaki Nanami first started trying to play video games with him. First started inviting him along to join those Ultimate Students he had been afraid he could never honestly belong alongside.

The next day…  Pretty soon, now…  Hajime and Nagito would head out to a little party Chiaki was throwing – something for the end of the year, and something for Hajime, and something for the release of this adventure-y puzzle game she was really excited to try out with everyone.  The Ultimate Gymnast had even promised not to lash out at the screen if the puzzles got irritating, this time.  For a while, though, they ate dinner together like family, and when Nagito reached over to squeeze Hajime’s hand under the table – a silent plea for rescue from a question he wasn’t sure how to answer – it was getting harder and harder to remember why Hajime didn’t feel like enough.


End file.
